April II, 1889] 



NA TURE 



575 



containing an account of the occasional persistence ot the left 

 posterior cardinal vein in the Frog. This condition, abnormal 

 in the Frog, was shown to be essentiallymormal in Protopterus. — 

 A communication was read from Mr. J. Douglas Ogilby, con- 

 taining notes on some fishes new to the Australian fauna. — Mr. 

 Oldfield Thomas read a paper giving the description of a new 

 Bomean Monkey belonging to the genus Semnopithecus, obtained 

 by Mr. Charles Hose on the north-west coast of Borneo. The 

 author proposed to name it Semnopithecus /losei, after its 

 discoverer. 



April 2.— Prof. Flower, F.R.S., President, in the chair. 

 — The Secretary read a report on the additions that had 

 been made to the Society's Menagerie during the month of 

 March 1889, and called attention to a specimen of the Manatee 

 \Manatus australis), purchased March 2, being the second 

 example of this Sirenian obtained alive by the Society ; to an 

 Oriental Phalanger [Phalaiigcr oricntalis, var. breziceps), pre- 

 sented by Mr. C. M. Woodford, of Sydney ; and to a specimen 

 of Owen's Apteryx {Apteryxmveni), presented by Captain C. A. 

 Findlay. — Mr. Smith- Woodwar4 exhibited and made remarks 

 on a maxilla of the early Mesozoic Ganoid Saurichthys, from 

 the Rhjetic formation of Aust Cliff, near Bristol. — A communi- 

 cation was read from Mr. W. K. Parker, on the osteology of 

 Steatornis caripensis. The conclusion arrived at as regards the 

 affinities of this isolated form of birds was that Steatornis is a 

 waif of an ancient avifauna, of which all the near allies are 

 extinct, and that Podargus of Australia is its nearest surviving 

 relative. — Mr. Oldfield Thomas read some preliminary notes on 

 the characters and synonymy of the different species of Otter. 

 The author gave a revised synonymy of the four species of Lutra 

 recognized as belonging to the Palsearctic and Indian Regions, 

 and of the two found in the i^thiopian Region. The American 

 Otters, for want of a larger series of specimens, could not at 

 present be satisfactorily worked out. — Mr. E. T. Newton read 

 a paper, entitled "A Contribution to the History of Eocene 

 Siluroid Fishes." Mr. Newton observed that spines of Siluroid 

 fishes from the Bracklesham Beds were described by Dixon in 

 his "Fossils of Sussex" (1850), and referred to the genus 

 Si/urus. Mr. A. Smith-Woodward had recently shown good 

 reason for referring these specimens, and certain cephalic plates 

 from the same horizon, to the tropical genus Arius. The 

 greater part of a skull, from the Eocene Beds of Barton, in 

 the Museum of the Geological Survey, confirmed the latter 

 generic reference. Its close resemblance to a skull of Arius 

 gagorides in the British Museum left no room for questioning 

 their generic relationship, while at the same time the fossil 

 differed from any known species of Arius. The fortunate dis- 

 covery of one of the otoliths within the fossil skull, and its 

 resemblance in important points to that of A. gagorides, still 

 further confirmed this determination. Some other otoliths 

 from Barton, and one from Madagascar, were also referred to 

 the genus Arius. — Mr. A. Smith- Woodward read a note on 

 Buck/audium diluvii, a fossil from the London Clay of Sheppey, 

 noticed by Konig, and hitherto not satisfactorily determined. 

 It was shown that this fossil was a portion of the skull of a 

 Siluroid Fish allied to the existing genus Auchenoglanis. — A 

 communication was read from Mr. H. W. Bates, F.R. S., con- 

 taining descriptions of new species of the Coleopterous family 

 Carabidre, collected by Mr. J. H. Leech in Kashmir and 

 Baltistan. — A second communication from Mr. Bates gave de- 

 scriptions of some new species of the Coleopterous families 

 Cicindelidoe and Carabidae, taken by Mr. Pratt at Chang Yang, 

 near Ichang, in China. 



Paris. 

 Academy of Sciences, April i. — M. Des Cloizeaux, 

 President, in the chair. — On regulating the velocity of a 

 ('.ynamo-electric machine serving as a receiver in the transniission 

 of force by electricity, by M. Marcel Deprez. The case is first 

 considered of the magnetic field and of the electromotive force 

 of each machine, which are shown to be functions of the 

 intensity of the general current only when the inducting electros 

 are disposed in a simple series in the principal circuit. Cases 

 are then discussed in which the receiver has a constant mag- 

 netic, field, and in which the field of the generator is constant.-— 

 On the biorthogonal reduction of a lineo-linear form to its 

 canonical form., by Prof. Sylvester. Taking F as a lineo-linear 

 function of two series, of letters — ; 



^l» •*'2» • • • > -^w > ?1> M> * • • » ?« > 



then F will contain «- terms. By subjecting the letters x and 

 4 respectively to two independent orthogonal substitutions. 



arbitrary quantities are introduced into |the Ttransformed form 

 M- - «, so that by giving them suitable values we should be 

 able to get rid of this number of terms while retaining the n 

 pairs alone, whose arguments will be, for instance, 



■^lii. x^v • • • XnU- 

 Prof. Sylvester here calls the multiples of these arguments the 

 canonical inultiplicators ; he gives the rule for determining 

 them, and at the same lime for finding the two simultaneous 

 orthogonal substitutions which lead to the canonical form. — On 

 the progress of the Suez Canal, and its state in the year 1888, 

 by M. de Lesseps. Of the works undertaken to widen the 

 Canal from 22 to 65, 75, and in some places even 80 metres, 

 some have already been completed, and for a distance of about 

 15 kilometres from Port Said vessels have now ample space for 

 passing each other. The depth will be increased to 850, and 

 ultimately to 9 metres, and navigation by night is facilitated by 

 luminous buoys and tow-paths, the light being obtained by 

 means of compressed gas. All the sidings have been widened 

 to 100 metres between Suez and Port Said, thus allowing six 

 large vessels to be shunted at the same time in all of them. 

 Ships using the electric light are now able to traverse the Canal 

 in about twenty hours, the time hitherto required being from 

 thirty-five to forty hours. In 1888 tlie Canal was traversed by 

 3440 vessels of 6,640,832 tons (2625 of 5,223,254 tons, British), 

 yielding to the Company 65, 102,000 francs in tolls, &c. — 

 On an aperiodic balance with direct readings of the last 

 fractional weights, by M. P. Curie. The instrument here 

 described, and illustrated with a vertical section and a general 

 view, has been constructed for the purpose of increasing the 

 rapidity and accuracy of weighing operations in scientific and 

 industrial laboratories. — On transformation and equilibrium in 

 thermodynamics, by M. P. Duhem. It is pointed out that the 

 "new function" spoken of by M. Gouy in a recent communi- 

 cation {Comptes rendus, cviii. p. 507), had already been antici- 

 pated by Mr. J. W. Gibbs, in 1873, whose views were later 

 explained by M. Duhem in his work on the thermo-dynamic 

 potential. — On the difference of potential at contact of a metal 

 and of a salt of the same metal, by M. H. Pellat. The author's 

 researches lead to a general law thus expressed : The difference 

 of normal potential between a metal and the solution of a salt 

 of the same metal is nil. It also follows that the difference of 

 potential of two salts of the same acid and of different metal at con- 

 tact, increased by the difference of potential of these metals placed 

 in contact, is proportional to the quantity of heat liberated by 

 the substitution of one of the metals for the other in the salt of 

 the acid in question.— On telephonography, by M. E. Merca- 

 dier. The problem of telephonography— that is, the transmis- 

 sion of sound to distances by telegraph lines, for instance — is 

 here studied in connection with the recent improvements of the 

 phonograph by its inventor, Mr. Edison, and by Mr. S. Tainter 

 (graphophone). M. Mercadier's process, which shows good 

 results even with inferior instruments, appears to be much 

 simpler than that by which Mr. Edison has lately succeeded in 

 communicating along the wires between New York and Phila- 

 delphia, using for the purpose his new improved phonograph. — 

 Papers were contributed by M. F. Beaulard, on the doable 

 elliptical refraction of quartz ; by M. Woukoloff, on the law of 

 the solubility of gases ; by M. Rene Drouin, on succinamic 

 nitrile ; by M. Albert Colson, on the artificial and natural alka- 

 loids ; by MM. P. Langloi^ and Ch. Richet, on the strength of 

 the respiratory function as affected by ancesthetics ; by M. Abel 

 Dutartre, on the action of the poison of the land salamander 

 (Salamandra macuiosa) ; and by M. Haug, on the Lias 

 formations in the sub- Alpine ranges between Digne and Gap. 



Berlin. 

 Meteorological Society, March 12. — Prof, von Bezold, 

 President, in the chair. — Dr. Wagner spoke on the connection 

 between cosmic and meteorological phenomena. After a short 

 review of the earlier attempts to connect meteorological 

 phenomena with the rotation of the sun or with the phases of 

 the moon, he passed on to a consideration of Prof, von Bezold's 

 recently published work, in which it is shown that the .storms in 

 Bavaria and Wiirtemberg have a distinctly recurrent periodicity 

 of 26 days, corresponding to the period (25 84 days) of the sun's 

 rotation. In opposition to this, Koppen had found from his own 

 calculations, based on more extensive data, that the storms are 

 recurrent with a periodicity of 29 and not 26 days, thus corre- 

 sponding to the synodical period of the moon. The speaker had 

 himself investigated the periodicity of storms, not only in Bavaria 



